By Severin

Georges Braque, don't do that …

Now children, I want you all to say “Good Morning” to Mr Landlord. Good Morning Mr Landlord.

No, Sidney, not “goodbye”, or "goodnight". The reason Mr Landlord looks so tired is that he’s only just got back from Glastonbury.

Now, today, we are painting and talking about painters, and this is my friend, Caroline who is painting such a lovely picture with her Painting Box.

I wonder what it is? Perhaps it’s a mouse, or a cat, or something. Oh, it’s a girl with a pearl earring. For a moment I thought it was a cat but now you tell me I can see…

Well, no dear, it’s not quite like Vermeer. Very similar in style but No One Was Quite Like Vermeer, I’m afraid

Sidney, don’t throw paint at Edgar, please. Thank you.

I know I said you can choose what you are going to do but you cannot choose to throw paint at Edgar. That’s not “action painting”, that’s just being silly.

I’m sorry, Mr Landlord, he’s gone off in a huff. He says we’ll all be sorry “When I Paint My Masterpiece” I don’t think we’ll wait for that, shall we?

What’s that, Edgar? “Yume no Ukiyo ni Saite Mi na?” I’m not sure I understand, dear. Are you speaking with your mouth full? If so, take it out.

Oh, it was Japanese. That’s very good, Edgar. It means “Try to Bloom in a Dream about the Floating World.” He’s been to the British Museum and saw the Ukiyo E exhibition.

Sidney, take that paintbrush out of your ear! Yes it is a paintbrush! You can’t just say it isn’t. That’s not art, that’s being silly.

He has been looking at Magritte paintings, I’m afraid and he’s got quite the wrong idea.

Whose paintbrush was it anyway? Oh, it’s Lavinia’s! Lavinia has been painting pictures of Heaven with lots of lovely black angels. She says that the other painters paint beautiful angels but they never remember to paint black angels so she’s putting that right.

Yes, “Angelitos Negros”, Lavinia. That’s very good. We have been learning Spanish I see.

No Sidney, you can’t Paint Her Face. Lavinia doesn’t want her face painted. And you can’t Paint Me either. Why don’t you paint a nice picture on the paper I’ve given you?

Well, you could paint a picture of a house. Or a picture of mummy or daddy. Or somebody else. It doesn’t really matter as long as you keep the paintbrush out of your ear and the paint off other people.

Ah, you’re going to do a Portrait of a Man. That’s very good, we’ll decide who it is later shall we?

Now, Mr Landlord, Hazel here has been painting trees and animals. Oh it’s a jungle with lions and snakes is it Hazel? Yes, I think I can see.

Hazel wants to paint like Henri Rousseau. The Jungle Line she calls it. I do like to encourage creativity in our children. Some of them had only done Painting By Numbers before we started these classes.

Now, Sidney, you seem to have finished your picture, do you want to show it to us? Aren’t you going to give the man a nose? No nose?

I do think it’s so interesting the way they see things.

Georges! Georges! Don’t do that!

Well, because it’s not nice dear. Well yes, art is supposed to challenge people but perhaps it’s a good idea to wait a while before being quite as challenging as that …

Guru’s Wildcard Pick:

Honolulu Mountain Daffodils – I feel Like a Francis Bacon painting

I did consider including a jazz or classical instrumental piece in the main list but in the end went for songs about painters or painting. Here’s an alternative list of instrumental music that might have made it.

Jon Spencer’s explosive solo to Marianne Faithfull’s gentle honesty, Bill Ryder-Jones love songs to music by the film director David Lynch, this week’s album roundup embraces a wealth of experimentation and styles

Word of the week: It's the infinitesimally small subatomic particle which forms matter, a type of curdled cheese from soured milk, is used in computer language and in sci-fi fiction names, but where in lyrics?

Word of the week: With an appropriately flamboyant sound and rhythm it’s a word best known for the title of Freddie Mercury’s epic Bohemian Queen song, and several major classical works, but where is it used in song lyrics?

Word of the week: It’s an adjective with a beautiful sound. It means the characteristics of our ape cousins, but of course sharing almost all the same DNA, it also means us. But where is simian in lyrics?

Word of the Week: It sizzles off the tongue, it’s the name of a great inventor, and after him, a unit of magnetic flux density, and it’s also a car, and in slang recreational drug, but where does it appear in song lyrics?

Word of the Week: It’s a word with a beautiful sound formed from the Latin word, umbra, for shade, is not merely an expanding accessory to shelter from the rain, also a general term of protection or a thing made of many parts

Word of the Week: It’s a famous Bjork album, but where does it come up in lyrics? The root of this word relates to the evening and its tolling bell, but also bats, Venus, a cocktail, and in slang – a kind, smart, cool girl

Word of the Week: It’s a slim, fast dog, the name of a car, a ship, a tank and a light aircraft, and also slang for recreational use of nitrous oxide from small metal containers, but where does it appear in song?

Word of the week: It’s an idealised location of magnificence and beauty with Chinese origins described in Coleridge’s poem, and a 1980 film starring Olivia Newton-John and song performed with ELO, but where else does it appear in lyrics?

Word of the week: Following on from zephyr last week, we work backwards to a colour term that can pertain to cheap books, a fish, a mussel, insect, a certificate for gold, and in urban slang, council workers wearing hi-vis jackets

Word of the week: Launching a new Song Bar series highlighting words or phrases used in lyrics for the oddness or musicality, let’s start with a z-word, and several examples including Madonna, Bill Callaghan, Frank Sinatra and Ian Dury

Song of the Day: Continuing a week of WW1 anniversary songs, in an unusually tender song from the heavy rock band, it’s a tragic first-person narration of the Battle of the Somme where 19,000 British soldiers were killed before noon

Song of the Day: Next in a week of songs dedicated to the First World War Armistice centenary, a deeply sad and vivid song by Ray Davies about the fleeting life of a young soldier killed in 1916 from the 1969 album, Arthur

Song of the Day: Continuing on the First World War Armistice Day centenary, a trio of some of the finest songs about war from the British singer and composer from her acclaimed 2011 album Let England Shake

Song of the Day: Today’s date, 7 November, is significant in all sorts of ways - elections, revolutions, births, deaths, but it’s the day in 1908 when two of America’s most famous outlaws were reportedly killed on the run in Bolivia

Song of the Day: In the wake of the most vital mid-term US elections in a generation, the 1972 rock song that is often wheeled out on these occasions, but less known is that it is a reworking of an earlier song, Reflected